Reports to the Commissioner of Police and others, on Queensland Aborigines, 1898-1900, 1903, by Walter Edmund Roth

CY 208

fonds

1898-1903

Textual Records, Graphic Materials, Drawings, Photographs

897195

1 microfilm reel (part) of textual material, drawings and photographs.

Walter Edmund Roth was born in London in 1861. He undertook medical training at St Thomas's Hospital, London before coming to Australia in 1887 where he worked as a schoolteacher. In 1890 he returned to London to complete his medical training. From 1894 he practised medicine in north-west Queensland. He developed an interest in Aboriginal anthropology and in 1898 was appointed as the first northern protector of Aborigines. Part of his responsibilities was to record Aboriginal cultures but his main brief was to prevent the exploitation of Aborigines, particularly in employment and marriage. In 1904-06 he was chief protector. In 1904 he also headed the Western Australian Royal Commission into the Conditions of the Aborigines in the North-West. He resigned in 1906 on grounds of ill health and left Australia. He published 18 ethnographic bulletins on various aspects of Aboriginal culture, based on his official reports.

Reference:
Australian Dictionary of Biography, Vol. 11, (MUP), 1988

1. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, June 1898.

2. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, July 1898. The Aborigines of Rockhampton and surrounding coastal districts, with vocabularies and sign language

3. Some Ethnographical Notes of the Atherton Blacks, Oct. 1898, with vocabularies including Chirpal, Kung-gan-ji, Ngachan, Nigi-komga, Yi-diri-ji.

4. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, Dec. 1898. The Aborigines occupying the hinterland of Princess Charlotte Bay.

5. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, Dec. 1898. Some of the plants of economic value to the coastal Aborigines of N.E. Queensland with notes on their preparation, uses, native names etc.

6. Letter to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland from Magdalen Mulum, the Cape Bedford Mission, 1899.

7. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, May 1899. An Account of the Ko-ko-minni Aborigines occupying the country drained by the middle Palmer River, with vocabularies, including Kokominni & Kundara.

8. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, April 1899. Rock paintings of Clack’s Island.

9. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, June 1899. Initiation ceremony of the Koko-yimidir speaking Aborigines of Cooktown and vicinity.

10. Report to the Commissioner of Police, Queensland, Jan. 1900. On the Aborigines of the Pennefather (Coen) River district and other coastal tribes occupying the country between Batavia and Embley Rivers, with vocabularies.

11. Scientific Report to the Under Secretary, Home Secretary’s Office, Qld., Sept. 1900. On the natives of the lower Tully River, with Appendix, Dec. 1900.

12. Report of visit to the Wellesley Islands, June 1903.

Occasional items of vocabulary, as well as word lists, are scattered throughout these reports.

Copyright status:: In copyright

The original collection is held at Queensland State Archives. It was transferred in 1977 from the Mitchell Library (Call Number: MLMSS 216)

Information transferred from Manuscripts Leaf Catalogue No. 2 as part of the eRecords Project, 2009-2010

Note:
Sign language, frames 77-80
Vocabulary, frames 81-180
Chirpal, Kung-gan-ji, Ngachan, Nigi-komga, Yi-diri-ji vocabularies, 197 - 213
Other vocabularies including:
Kokominni, frames 369-376 (Some of this is published in 'Ethnological Studies' 1897)
Koko-olkullo, frames 377-384
Kundara, frames 385-392
Original manuscript call number: MLMSS 216.